No Experience Necessary is Chef Norman Van Aken s joyride of a memoir. In it he spans twenty-plus years and nearly as many jobs including the fateful job advertisement in the local paper for a short-order cook with no experience necessary. Long considered a culinary renegade and a pioneering chef, Van Aken is an American original who chopped and charred, sweated and seared his way to cooking stardom with no formal training, but with extra helpings of energy, creativity, and faith. After landing on the deceptively breezy shores of Key West, Van Aken faced hurricanes, economic downturns, and mercurial moneymen during the decades when a restaurant could open and close faster than you can type haute cuisine . From a graveyard shift grunt at an all-night barbeque joint to a James Beard award finalist for best restaurant in America, Van Aken put his trusting heart, poetic soul, natural talent, and ever-expanding experience into every venture and helped transform the American culinary landscape along the way. In the irreverent tradition of Anthony Bourdain s Kitchen Confidential , and populated by a rogues gallery of colorful characters including movie stars, legendary musicians, and culinary giants Julia Child, Emeril Lagasse, and Charlie Trotter No Experience Necessary offers a uniquely personal, highly-entertaining under-the-tablecloth view of the high-stakes world of American cuisine told with wit, insight, and great affection by a natural storyteller.

Perhaps you remember the whipped splendor of the Choco-Lite, or the luscious Caravelle bar, or maybe the sublime and perfectly balanced Hershey's Cookies 'n Mint. The Marathon, an inimitable rope of caramel covered in chocolate. Oompahs. Bit-O-Choc. The Kit Kat Dark. Steve Almond certainly does. In fact, he was so obsessed by the inexplicable disappearance of these bars where'd they go? that he embarked on a nationwide journey to uncover the truth about the candy business. There, he found an industry ruled by huge conglomerates, where the little guys, the last remaining link to the glorious boom years of the candy bar in America, struggle to survive. Visiting the candy factories that produce the Twin Bing, the Idaho Spud, the Goo Goo Cluster, the Valomilk, and a dozen other quirky bars, Almond finds that the world of candy is no longer a sweet haven. Today's precious few regional candy makers mount daily battles against corporate greed, paranoia, and that good old American compulsion: crushing the little guy. Part candy porn, part candy polemic, part social history, part confession, Candyfreak explores the role candy plays in our lives as both source of pleasure and escape from pain. By turns ecstatic, comic, and bittersweet, Candyfreak is the story of how Steve Almond grew up on candy and how, for better and worse, candy has grown up, too.

"Everything in this book is delightful to learn. Barnette takes us through languages and across millennia in a charming style . . . that offers endless food for thought." --The New Yorker What makes the pretzel a symbol of religious devotion, and what pasta is blasphemous in every bite? How did a drunken brawl lead to the name lobster Newburg? What naughty joke is contained in a loaf of pumpernickel? Why is cherry a misnomer, and why aren't refried beans fried twice? You'll find the answers in this delectable exploration of the words we put into our mouths. Here are foods named for the things they look like, from cabbage from the Old North French caboche, "head" to vermicelli "little worms" . You'll learn where people dine on nun's tummy and angel's breast. There are foods named after people Graham crackers and places peaches , along with commonplace terms derived from words involving food and drink dope, originally a Dutch word for "dipping sauce" . Witty, bawdy, and stuffed with stories, Ladyfingers and Nun's Tummies is a feast of history, culture, and language. "Why didn't anyone think of this before? . . . What fun Martha Barnette has made of it all, every name for every dish explained and traced and jollied." --William F. Buckley, Jr.

Provence, 1970 is about a singular historic moment. In the winter of that year, more or less coincidentally, the iconic culinary figures James Beard, M.F.K. Fisher, Julia Child, Richard Olney, Simone Beck, and Judith Jones found themselves together in the South of France. They cooked and ate, talked and argued, about the future of food in America, the meaning of taste, and the limits of snobbery. Without quite realizing it, they were shaping today s tastes and culture, the way we eat now. The conversations among this group were chronicled by M.F.K. Fisher in journals and letters some of which were later discovered by Luke Barr, her great-nephew. In Provence, 1970, he captures this seminal season, set against a stunning backdrop in cinematic scope complete with gossip, drama, and contemporary relevance.

You ll love this intimate portrait of the inimitable Julia Child by Nancy Verde Barr, her executive chef and friend for twenty-four years. Brimming with anecdotes, memorabilia, and snapshots, Backstage with Julia conveys Julia s generosity, her boundless energy, and her love of food and life. This loving memoir celebrates the adventurous, unassuming essence of the chef who seasoned American palates and heightened our appreciation of food.

How does a nice Italian boy from Queens turn his passion for food and wine into an empire? In his winning memoir, Restaurant Man , Joe Bastianich charts his culinary journey from working in his parents red-sauce joint to becoming one of the country s most successful restaurateurs. Joe first learned the ropes from his father, Felice Bastianich, the ultrapragmatic, self-proclaimed restaurant man. After college and a year on Wall Street, Joe bought a one-way ticket to Italy and worked in restaurants and vineyards. Upon his return to New York, he partnered with his mother, Lidia, and soon joined forces with Mario Batali, establishing one superlative Italian restaurant after another. Writing vividly in an authentic New York style that is equal parts rock n roll and hard-ass, bottom-line business reality, Joe explains: how Babbo changed the way people think of Italian restaurants; how Lupa and Esca were born of hedonistic, boondoggle R D trips through Italy; and how Del Posto managed to overcome a menu that was so ambitious that at first it could not even be executed and became the first four-star Italian restaurant in America. He lays the smackdown on the wine industry, explaining that no bottle of wine costs more than five dollars to make. Joe speaks frankly about friends and foes, but at the heart of the book is the mythical hero Restaurant Man, the old-school, bluecollar guy from Queens who once upon a time learned to sweat it out and make his money through hard work. Throughout he stays true to the real secret of his success watching costs but being ferociously dedicated to exceeding the customer s expectations on every level and delivering the best dining experience in the world.

Winner of the 1999 Versailles World Cookbook Fair Award For Best Culinary History, English LanguageIn Leslie Brenner's "witty and sumptuous" look at the history of the American food revolution, an award-winning food writer traces a fascinating culinary heritage and looks to a promising future. Hundreds of years ago, Native Americans feasted on regional ingredients like Olympia oysters, fresh herbs, and wild fowl. Now the best American chefs are returning to those roots. How did we get here? From the Puritan diet to Prohibition, from Julia Child through waves of immigration in the 1960s, Brenner traces the evolution of a national cuisine in delicious detail. Highlighted by interviews with Ameria's leading culinary innovators, including Julia Child, Alice Waters, and Robert Mondavi--and aided by heaping dollops of wit and opinion--Brenner serves up a singular history of American cuisine that will be of deep interest to anyone who loves to eat well.

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Bullock-Prado, GesineMy Life from Scratch: A Sweet Journey of Starting Over, One Cake at a Time Broadway Books 2010 paperback. . Some wear from use. Good used book.. BOOK COND: Used; Good. Book #or989164. ISBN #0767932730 / 9780767932738. (filed under: Cookbooks / Food History ) *

Bullock-Prado, GesineMy Life from Scratch: A Sweet Journey of Starting Over, One Cake at a Time Broadway Books 2010 paperback. . Some wear from use. Good used book.. BOOK COND: Used; Good. Book #or989164. ISBN #0767932730 / 9780767932738. (filed under: Cookbooks / Food History ) *

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A former Hollywood insider trades the Hollywood Hills for Green Acres and lives to tell about it in this hilarious, poignant treat of a memoir. As head of her celebrity sister s production company, Gesine Bullock-Prado had a closet full of designer clothes and the ear of all the influential studio heads, but she was miserable. The only solace she found was in her secret hobby: baking. With every sugary, buttery confection to emerge from her oven, Gesine took one step away from her glittery, empty existence and one step closer to her true destiny. Before long, she and her husband left the trappings of their Hollywood lifestyle behind, ending up in Vermont, where they started the gem known as Gesine Confectionary. And they never looked back. Confections of a Closet Master Baker follows Gesine's journey from sugar-obsessed child to miserable, awkward Hollywood insider to reluctant master baker. Chock-full of eccentric characters, beautifully detailed descriptions of her baking process, ceaselessly funny renditions of Hollywood nonsense, and recipes, the ingredients of her story will appeal to anyone who has ever considered leaving the life they know and completely starting over. From the Hardcover edition.

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Butturini, PaulaKeeping the Feast: One Couple's Story of Love, Food, and Healing Riverhead Books 2011 paperback. . Some wear from use. Good used book.. BOOK COND: Used; Very Good. Book #or1108448. ISBN #1594485003 / 9781594485008. (filed under: Cookbooks / Food History ) *

Butturini, PaulaKeeping the Feast: One Couple's Story of Love, Food, and Healing Riverhead Books 2011 paperback. . Some wear from use. Good used book.. BOOK COND: Used; Very Good. Book #or1108448. ISBN #1594485003 / 9781594485008. (filed under: Cookbooks / Food History ) *

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A story of food and love, injury and healing, Keeping the Feast is the triumphant memoir of one couple overcoming depression through nourishment and restoration in Italy Paula Butturini and John Tagliabue met in Italy, fell in love, and four years later, married in Rome. But less than a month after the wedding, tragedy struck. They had transferred from their Italian paradise to Warsaw and while reporting on an uprising in Romania, John was shot and nearly killed by sniper fire. Although he recovered from his physical wounds in less than a year, the process of healing had just begun. Unable to regain his equilibrium, her husband became depressed, sinking into a deep sadness that reverberated throughout their relationship. It was the abrupt end of what they'd known together, and the beginning of a new phase of life neither had planned for. All of a sudden, Paula was forced to reexamine her marriage, her husband, and herself. Paula began to reconsider all of her previous assumptions about healing. She discovered that sometimes patience can be a vice, anger a virtue. That sometimes it is vital to make demands of the sick, that they show signs of getting better. And she rediscovered the importance of the most fundamental of human rituals: the daily sharing of food around the family table. A universal story of hope and healing, Keeping the Feast is an account of one couple's triumph over tragedy and illness, and a celebration of the simple rituals of life, even during the worst life crises. Beautifully written and tremendously moving, Paula's story is a testament to the extraordinary sustaining powers of food and love, and to the stubborn belief that there is always an afterward, there is always hope.

Since the days of the Persian empire, caviar has trumpeted status, wealth, prestige, and sex appeal. Today it goes for up to one hundred dollars an ounce, and aficionados will go to extraordinary lengths to get their fill of it. According to acclaimed writer Richard Adams Carey, that's just the problem. In this spectacular jaunt, Carey immerses himself in the world of sturgeon, the fish that lays these golden eggs. What he finds is disturbing. Sturgeon population worldwide have declined 70 percent in the last twenty years, most drastically in the Caspian Sea. The beluga sturgeon, producer of the most coveted caviar, has climbed to number four on the World Wildlife Fund's most-endangered species list. Armed with a novelist's eye for human eccentricity and an investigator's nose for trouble Carey takes us on an illuminating journey across the globe to uncover, the secrets of the sturgeon. On that trek we meet the fascinating real-life characters both profiting from its scarcity and fighting to save it. A high-stakes cocktail of business, diplomacy, technology, and espionage, The Philosopher Fish is, at its heart, the epic story of a 250-million year-old fish struggling to survive.

Julia Child became a household name when she entered the lives of millions of Americans through our hearts and kitchens. Yet few know the richly varied private life that lies behind this icon whose statuesque height and warmly enthused warble have become synonymous with the art of cooking. In this biography, we meet the earthy and outrageous Julia, who, at age eighty-five, remains a complex role model. Fitch, who had access to all of Julia's private letters and diaries, takes us through her life from her exuberant youth as a high-spirited California girl to her years at Smith College, where Julia was at the center of every prank and party. When most of her girlfriends married, Julia volunteered with the OSS in India and China during World War II, and was an integral part of this elite corps. There she met her future husband, the cosmopolitan Paul Child, who introduced her to the glories of art, fine French cuisine, and love. Theirs was a deeply passionate romance and a modern marriage of equals. Julia began her culinary training only at the age of thirty-seven at the Cordon Bleu. Later she roamed the food markets of Marseilles, Bonn, and Oslo. She invested ten years of learning and experimentation in what would become her first bestselling classic, Mastering the Art of French Cooking. Now, her career is legend, spanning nearly forty years and still going strong. Generations love the humor and trademark aplomb that have made Julia Child a household name. Resisting fads and narrow, fanatical conventions of health-consciousness, Julia is the quintessential teacher. The perfect gift for food lovers and a romantic biography of a woman modern before her time, this is a truly Amer

The late author of Home Cooking combines her writing skills with her love of cooking in a collection of essays on food and entertaining that discuss the challenges of being a working mother. 25,000 first printing. National ad promo.

Take a visual tour of the best indie coffeehouses in Seattle and Portland, and learn all you'll ever need to know about the drink and the baristas who serve it. Featuring the voices of more than 100 Northwest baristas and roasters, this collection of photos, drawings, confessionals, instruction, humor, history, advice, and more offers and entertaining and informative inside look at the epicenter of American coffee.

For many people the idea of opening a restaurant is the stuff of dreams. Terence Conran has been making that dream a reality for over forty years, remaining at the cutting edge of those influencing culinary tastes here and abroad. He is the mastermind behind hotspots like Quaglino's, Mezzo, Paris's Alcazar, and, most recently, Manhattan's Gustavino's, his first American restaurant venture, which opened to rave reviews. Now, with his new book, Conran helps readers follow their own dreams, drawing on his nth experience as a restaurateur to reveal the secrets behind his successes.Filled with anecdotes and practical advice, Terence Conran on Restaurants covers every aspect of starting your own restaurant: from the idea to finding a location, planning the budget, designing the space, choosing the menu, and even training the staff. Using his own restaurants as models, he demonstrates the hard work, planning, and attention to detail needed to open and run a successful establishment. Complete with interviews with top people in the restaurant business and 250 color photographs many specially commissioned for this book , Terence Conran on Restaurants is the most lavish and comprehensive book of its kind.

"Marc David eloquently describes the importance of addressing the emotional and spiritual aspects of our lives in order to truly nourish ourselves." --Dean Ornish, M.D. Combining the principles of nutritional awareness, personal growth, and body psychology, Nourishing Wisdom provides practical methods for redefining the role food plays in our lives. Line drawings. From the Trade Paperback edition.

Twenty years in the making, here is the long-awaited magnum opus from one of the world's great authorities on the history and use of food. This Companion is packed with 2,650 delightfully written A-Z entries--including 39 feature articles on staple foods--the vast majority penned by the renowned Alan Davidson, with additional articles by over fifty specialists from as far afield as the Philippines, Norway, and Australia. The coverage is spectacular, with the most wide-ranging treatment ever of foods and food products and how to use them. Indeed, the Companion covers everything--plant products, meats, birds and eggs, dairy products, nuts, fish and all seafoods, plant foods, cereals, and exotic foods. Davidson examines famous dishes from around the world--from cassoulet, croque-monsieur, and couscous, to spam, sherbet, and sonofabitch stew. There are over 140 entries on national and regional cuisines Cajun cooking, Pennsylvania Dutch . Even Antarctica is included in this unique panorama. Other subjects covered in depth include food preservation, culinary terms and techniques, food science and diet, cookbooks and their authors, and the role of food in culture and religion. The book is enhanced by some 180 exquisite illustrations of foods by Laotian artist Soun Vannithone, ranging from the comfortingly familiar to the bizarre and rare. In fact, the common and the exotic mingle throughout, with the everyday apples, apricots and the exotic akee, ambarella, baobab found side by side. Here then is a true cornucopia, offering all the flavors, styles, and staples of the world, past and present, from classical Greek and Roman cookery to modern Australian and Hawaiian cuisines. Food historians, food scientists, food writers, chefs, restaurateurs, amateur cooks, and everyone with a serious interest in cooking--and eating--will feast on this authoritative reference on food.

Do you know the real Paula Deen? You may think you know the butter-loving, finger-licking, joke-cracking queen of melt-in-your-mouth Southern cuisine. You may have even visited The Lady Sons to taste for yourself the down-home delicacies that made her famous and even heard some version of her Cinderella story a single mom with two teenage sons started a brown-bag lunch business with 200 and wound up with a thriving restaurant, a fairy-tale second marriage, and wildly popular television shows , but you have never heard the intimate details of her often bumpy road to fame and fortune. Courageously honest, downright inspiring, and just a little bit saucy, Paula shares the highs and lows of her life in the inimitable charming and irreverent style that you know from her television shows and personal appearances. She talks about long childhood summers spent in a bathing suit and roller skates and hard years living in the back of her father's gas station; a buzzing high school social life of sleepovers, parties, cheerleading, and boys; and a difficult marriage. The death of her beloved parents precipitated a debilitating agoraphobia that crippled her for years. But even when the going got tough, Paula never lost the good grace and sense of humor that would eventually help carry her to success and stardom. Of course, you can't get by on charm alone: as Paula has learned, you need plenty of willpower, hard work, and, above all, the love and support of family and friends to finance, sustain, and run a successful restaurant. In each chapter, Paula shares new recipes: there's serious comfort food like her momma's Chocolate-Dippy Doughnuts, Courage Chili for when you know life's going to get tough, Sexy Oxtails for seducing that special someone, and the recipe for her new mother-in-law's Banana Nut Delight Cake that Paula finally got just right. And you'll love the never-before-seen photos of her family. In this memoir, Paula Deen speaks as frankly and intimately as few women in the public eye have ever dared. Whether she's telling tales of good times or bad, her story is proof that the old-fashioned American dream is alive and kicking, and there still is such a thing as a real-life happy ending.

Crossing class and color lines, and spanning the nation Montana has its huckleberry, Pennsylvania its shoofly, and Mississippi its sweet potato , pie -- real, homemade pie -- has meaning for all of us. But in today's treadmill, take-out world -- our fast-food nation -- does pie still have a place? As she traveled across the United States in an old Volvo named Betty, Pascale Le Draoulec discovered how merely mentioning homemade pie to strangers made faces soften, shoulders relax, and memories come wafting back. Rambling from town to town with Le Draoulec, you'll meet the famous, and sometimes infamous, pie makers who share their stories and recipes, and find out how a quest for pie can lead to something else entirely.

In this in-depth, behind-the-scenes tell-all about the lives of women chefs, journalist Charlotte Druckman walks the reader into the world behind the hot line. But this is a different perspective on the kitchen: one told through the voices of more than 70 of the best and brightest women cooking today, These are female chefs performing culinary and domestic high wire acts: juggling sharp knives, battering heat, bruising male egos, and working endless hours, often while raising small children and living from paycheck to paycheck. How they deal with pressures, the expectations, the successes and failures, makes for absorbing reading.

When Miriam, a mother-in-law and Holocaust survivor, takes her son's wife Elizabeth under her wing, she reawakens in her daughter-in-law a forgotten love of and need for Jewish rituals and traditions. 25,000 first printing. Tour."

Like many Jewish Americans, Elizabeth Ehrlich was ambivalent about her background. She identified with Jewish cultural attitudes, but not with the institutions; she had fond memories of her Jewish grandmothers, but she found their religious practices irrelevant to her life. It wasn?t until she entered the kitchen--and world--of her mother-in-law, Miriam, a Holocaust survivor, that Ehrlich began to understand the importance of preserving the traditions of the past. As Ehrlich looks on, Miriam methodically and lovingly prepares countless kosher meals while relating the often painful stories of her life in Poland and her immigration to America. These stories trigger a kind of religious awakening in Ehrlich, who--as she moves tentatively toward reclaiming the heritage she rejected as a young woman--gains a new appreciation of life?s possibilities, choices, and limitations.